In Their Own Words – Together

This week, we hear In Their Own Words from women who, through unforeseen circumstances, found a major change in their relationship with someone. We start with Jocelyn, who discovered something about her boss…

I’d being working as an intern for the MP for a few weeks, and that weekend she had asked me to accompany her to man a surgery in her constituency. Mrs Bates was in her mid-forties, and insisted on professional naming.

So that Saturday morning, I dressed in a blue sleeveless dress and dark brown strapped boots, and made my way to where the surgery was being held. Her constituency office was in the middle of the town, next to a jewellery store.

Yeah – you can see where this may be going.

When I opened the office door, it was quiet – a little too quiet, looking back, but right then I was just wanting to get the day over with. I called out for Mrs Bates, but there was no reply – and a moment later, when I walked into the main office, I saw why.

Mrs Bates was sat in a chair at her desk, wearing a white cardigan over a black top and pants, the legs of the pants tucked into black boots – but those booted ankles were tied together and to one of the front legs of the chair with white rope, while there was a band of white rope round her upper body as well. Her arms were going round the chair back, and there was a knotted black scarf pulled into her mouth.

“Shit - I thought you locked the front door.”

That’s when I saw the masked man beside the desk, and felt a disc pressing against my back.

“Just get this one secured as well – I’ll make sure nobody else can get in.”

“Over here, girlie,” the masked man said as he walked round the desk and pulled the chair round to be next to Mrs Bates. Swallowing, I walked over and sat down, my boss watching as my arms were pulled round the chair back and I felt rope on my wrists.

Mrs Bates could only watch as I was secured in the same way as her – but me, I was trying to memorise as much as I could of the two men, even as the ropes got tighter and tighter. I was then gagged like her, so that all we could do was look at each other and twist in the chair while one of the men guarded us, and the other went out of the back.

We could hear people knocking on the door, but were not able to do anything to raise the alarm – until the second man came back, carrying a leather bag which was full of jewels. They both then left us there, as the front door opened and closed.

“Hmshrrhhjslhn,” Mrs Bates said as she tried to talk, a line of drool escaping from the side of her mouth. I nodded – and then started to try and call for help.

It was what happened when the police finally arrived, and I was able to give a full description of the men, that Mrs Bates thanked me, and offered me a permanent position as her secretary. It is true – out of bad situations, good things can happen…

Our second tale takes us to London last September, and Zandra, a fashion designer who agreed to a socially distant interview in her studio…

Her name was Helen, a final year student at LSF, and she had started her dissertation on my work – so as the lockdown had been eased a little, I agreed to meet with her.

I remember my first impression of her as she came in – she was wearing a black sleeveless dress with a deep neckline, covered in silver writing and red hearts, dark stockings and over the knee black leather boots – one of my own designs, and with her long blonde hair she looked good in it.

As for me, I was wearing a blue elbow sleeved coat dress and a pair of leather boots I had also designed – black leather, with a floral pattern printed on the outside. I welcomed her in and offered her a seat, as we started to talk about my career and my new collection.

Did you know the biggest crime in the Fashion world is theft of designs? Not your most recent ones, but the ones you have started to do for your next show? So when I started to feel tired, and blinked, then noticed Helen was doing the same thing, I realised something was very, very wrong…

How long I was out for I don’t know, but when I finally opened my eyes I had a splitting headache, and my arms felt like they were held down by something. It took a few minutes for my eyes o adjust – and then I saw my arms had been hooked with someone behind me, my wrists tied together in front of me, and the rope taken down, around my legs and my ankles so that I was held in position.

I tried to talk, but I could only mumble as something puled on the skin round my mouth – and I realised I had some sort of tape stifling any noise from there.

I glanced at a full length mirror, and saw the browns ticking plaster on my chin – and I saw Helen was behind me, obviously bound and gagged in the same way. We were unable to move, unable to speak – and I could see the files on the floor which has contained my newest designs.

I tried to twist round, but all that did was make Helen try to move as well – and then I managed to get my hands to my mouth and yank the sticking plaster away from my mouth. I told Helen to remain calm, and then yelled.

And yelled.

And yelled for a good hour before someone came from the upstairs floor to see what was happening…

Charity shops can appear to be a surprising place for a robbery to take place – but some years ago, Mary was working in a Red Cross store when the surprising happened…

I was on my own in the store, and was very casually dressed – an old peach sweater, jeans and short black boots. It was the start of the lunch hour, and I was eating a sandwich as I sorted through a donation of books and other things that has been dropped off that morning.

These were old books as well, but in good condition, so when the door bell rang I said without looking up “I’ll be just a moment.”

“It’s okay – I can wait.”

I looked round to see a dark haired woman standing there, wearing a leopard skin design fleece with black sleeves, an black leggings which were tucked into a par of over the knee tan leather boots.

“Kate?”

“Hi Mum,” my daughter said as she looked at me, “you going grey?”

“It’s been a few years,” I said as I turned to look at her. It had been some years, since she had run off with her partner. “Is he here?”

“No – he’s out of my life now. It wasn’t a good time…”

“Did he hurt you?”

“Not in that way, but…”

Both of us looked round as the door opened, and a tall young man came in. He saw the books, and nodded as he turned back round – locking the door, and putting the sign to closed.

“Excuse me, what are you…”

“Not a word,” he said as he pointed a gun at me, Katy gasping, “both of you, face down on the floor.”

“Look, this is a charity shop,” Katy said, “you don’t have money, do you Mum?”

I shook my head, but he just said “who says I want money – now lie face down on the floor, both of you.”

“Mum…”

“Just do as he says,” I whispered as we lay down, and he grabbed a roll of twine from the cash desk area. Kneeling next to me, he pulled my hands behind my back and then bound my wrists tightly together with the twine, Katy watching with a worried expression as he wound the thin cords around and between my arms.

He then pulled my ankles back and tied them together in the same way, my booted feet waving in the air before he tied it off, and cut the end free with scissors. I had to watch as he did the same to my daughter, before he went to the clothing area and came bac with ap air of socks.

Socks which ended up in our mouths, my lips over the cotton sole as he told us not to spit them out. I though he was going to take what little money there was – but instead, he went to the book I had been sorting through, and drew three books out. Books he took with him as we both struggled on the floor, the thin twine biting into the flesh of my wrists.

“Mhhmmm?”

I looked over at Katy as she rolled onto her side, and then pushed the damp sock out of her mouth with her tongue. “Well – this happen often?”

I shook my head and then pushed my own gag out, as I said “look – I’m sorry I chased you away.”

“Hey – it happened, can we start again?”

“Well, it wasn’t as if we were going to do anything else…

Joy tells us the story of how she and her mentor in her local church spent a very different prayer time together…

We have a tradition at our church of two people praying together for an hour each hour throughout the Saturday – and it was at about one that Saturday that I joined Char in the sanctuary. Char is in her fifties, and was wearing a black pinafore dress with a floral print, a red cowl necked jumper under the dress, and long black felt boots. As for me, I was wearing a peach dress over a black jumper, a matching cardigan over the dress, and black leather boots.

We greeted each other and then sat on two chairs, closing my eyes as I tried to focus on praying for the church. That lasted for about five minutes – before something very strange happened.

And that something was a teenage girl, who told us to open our eyes – and we saw the knife in one of her hands, a roll of duct tape in the other, as she told us to hand over our car keys.

Well, we did that – and then she told me to tape Char to the chair she was sitting in. She told me to do as she said, so I taped her wrists and arms down to the chair armrests, and then taped her ankles together – before the girl made me wrap tape around her waist and lap as well.

I handed her back the tape, and took my seat, putting my arms down as she did the same thing to me. As she did this, Char suggested we continued praying, and so we did as I was more and more restrained.

IT actually helped calm me down – especially when I felt the tape pressed down over my mouth to keep me quiet. I opened my eyes to see the silver tape over her own mouth, but her eyes were closed behind her glasses, so I followed her example.

And it was the most focused, most productive prayer time I had ever experienced – it was as if being secured and gagged, there were no distractions, and we had to relax and focus on Him instead. When we were found at the end of the hour and freed, we found out she had robbed a local off-licence and needed a getaway car.

The strange thing is, once a month now, Char and I take turns to be secured and tape gagged, and the prayers we offer int hat time are most potent…

For our next tale, Samantha offers a tale of a special discovery…

Ruth and I have been work colleagues for some years, sharing secretarial duties for a firm of accountants, and we were good friends. We were both divorced – and in that we had a little more in common than the other girls.

We were both working in the office one Friday afternoon, while the partners were out. Ruth had short blond hair then, and was wearing a black and white leopard print jacket over a white top, black pants and black shoes, while I had on a red jacket over a grey slip dress, as well as a pair of mid-calf grey biker boots over black socks.

My hair? Long, chestnut brown, since you asked. At any rate, I needed to take a rest break, and I left Helen sorting through some files. When I came back, I saw someone else in the office – a smartly dressed young man, who was standing behind Helen, and she had her hands behind her back.

“Who are you,” I asked – and then I gasped as he pointed a gun at me, and told me to lock the office door. I felt I had no choice – and then as I walked over, I saw he had used white rope to bind Helen’s wrists together behind her back.

A few minutes later, my own wrists were secured together behind my back, as Helen said he had just walked in and ordered her to let him tie her arms. But then, form a bag, he produced two long lengths of rope, and used one of them to bind my arms tightly to my sides, forming two bands that framed my chest and pushed my jacket open.

I looked at Helen, and there was a strange look in her eyes as she looked at me. I wondered what she was thinking, as I felt the ropes being tightened once more, and then he walked over to do the same thing to her.

As he did so, her own jacket opened up, and I saw the way the ropes stretched her white top over her chest. She was looking at me as well, her head cocked to one side, and then she said something very strange.

She said I looked special like this – and she hoped I thought the same thing about her.

Well, there was something attractive about how she was looking, something I could not really put words to…

We were then made to sit next to each other at the back of the desk, and we watched as he bound our ankles tightly together, and then our legs below our knees. I shifted round, wondering still why the ropes felt so nice when they rubbed on me, and then I noticed Helen had a similar look in her eye. It seemed we were both discovering something new today…

He then took a roll of white tape, and tore a long, wide strip off which he pressed down over Helen’s mouth. I looked at her, the shape of her lips visible under the tape as it formed to the shape of her jaw – and then I heard the soft peeling sound and the tearing, before my own mouth was covered with another strip of the tape.

I could feel it as it stuck to my own chin, and then we could only watch as he put some files into a briefcase and then walked off. As he closed the door, I started to twist round, feeling the ropes rubbing on me, and wondering why it felt so good.

“Hhh.”

I turned and looked at Helen, who was looking at me – and I looked into her eyes as well. It was true, bound like that, she looked so…

And then I turned slightly and said “hlhhhn, whtddhuwhttthdh.”

“Iwhntthkhssuh. Hfffshnthdthhssuhfhrshmthm.”

I understood what she was saying, and wondered why I had not noticed it as I wriggled round – and then I nodded as she leaned over and gently pressed her taped lips on mine, moving them slightly.

And it felt so wonderful – I returned the kiss, and then sighed as I rested my head on her chest and moved it slightly.

“thssnhss – chnnhdhhtthuh?”

I nodded as she rubbed her cheek on my chest a swell, and then we managed to turn so that we could properly kiss each other, our eyes closed, saying all we needed to say with our actions and our eyes…

We’ve been together wince that day, ten years ago and tonight we’re celebrating our anniversary by repeating that afternoon…

Finally this week, a case of self tuition…

Bobbie was my next door neighbour, ad when she asked if she could come round for coffee I was very open to the idea. Our sons had been friends for some years, but we had rarely had the chance to talk.

SO when we were sitting at the table, and she mentioned she had caught her son looking at stories of mums tied up on the internet, I wondered of my son had looked as well. Turned out he had – and suddenly I realised some things he had said recently, about asking if I had any ropes or scarves, made sense…

I asked her what se wanted to do about it – and then she said she wondered if we could try it on each other. Now, Bobbie was wearing a black blouse and skirt, dark tights and a pair of dark grey boots, while I had a black gilet on over a blue jumper, a long wrap round grey skirt, and black boots.

Well, it intrigued me, so I asked her how we could do this. She stood up and went back t her house for a moment, returning with a white canvas sack, and suggested we go into the front room.

We sat on the floor, facing each other, and she asked me to watch as she took a length of brown rope from the bag, and started to tie my ankles together. It was the strangest feeling – I asked her where she had learned how to do this, and Bobbie blushed as she said she had done it to herself a few times. So I watched her as she took the rope between my legs, and then tied it off, leaving my ankles secured tightly together.

I said she was good, and Bobbie blushed before she passed me a length of rope. I should have said we were sitting with our legs parallel and facing each other, so that she could reach my ankles and I could reach hers.

She told me to do the same to her ankles, so I did the best I could, doubling the rope over and winding it tightly round her ankles, then tucking the ropes under a band and separating the lengths to take them between her legs, then tying the ends off behind her legs.

She looked at her ankles and twisted them round, then asked if I was all right. When I said I was, Bobbie then suggested we each take a length of the rope, and tied our legs together in the same way.

I had to fold my skirt back to do so, but I was up for the challenge – and a few minutes later, I was looking at the band of rope above Bobbie’s legs as I folded my skirt back down.

“So how do you propose we get up from here?” I asked.

“We don’t until we untie our legs,” Bobbie relied with a smile, “hey – wonder what the boys would…”

“MUM! Wow, did you tie yourself up as well, Mrs Morse?”

“I did,” Bobbie said as she looked at our sons, and then said the words.

“Come on – we know you want to tie us up, so tie our wrists and gag us.”

Which is how we ended up with our backs to the couch, our wrists tied together behind our backs, and a rolled up scarf between our lips as the boys watched us. It was the beginning of a very different friendship….

But what happened later is for another time. This has been In Their Own Words – for now, good night…

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